Cookie Monday?Chocolate Chip Banana

This morning while looking for inspiration for a Cookie recipe I saw 2 over ripe, borderline black bananas staring at me, just begging to be used. Now I don’t know if your house is anything like this, but in my house there seems to be this ongoing contest to see you can leave the (insert object here) on the (insert surface here) the longest. It really comes down to who is sick of seeing something the most to take care of it. Even tho the recycling bin is only 7 steps from the kitchen counter, the kitchen counter acts as a recycling holding tank, until someone breaks down and takes it to the bin. Or perhaps there is a tuna casserole that has been in the fridge for way to long, does it get emptied in a timely manner, no. It sits there until there is so little room left, a cheese slice wouldn’t fit in the fridge. So I guess somehow I should thank the universe for this phenomenon that happens in my house, since it let those bananas stay on the counter until my breaking point, and they got turned in to delicious cookies.

I found this really nice blog while looking for a recipe to turn the aforementioned bananas into cookies. It is called Vanilla Garlic, please check it out if you get a chance. Tons of really great stuff. I found this banana cookie recipe there and decided this would be how the lingering counter bananas would meet there demise.

1/2 cup of unsalted butter, room temperature

1 cup of sugar

1 egg, room temperature

1 cup of mashed bananas

1 teaspoon of baking soda

2 cups of flour

pinch of salt

1/2 teaspoon of ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon of ground mace or nutmeg

1/2 teaspoon of ground cloves

(optional) 1 cup of pecans or walnuts or chocolate chips (or mix and match)

It is a pretty straight forward recipe, I followed it verbatim as I really don’t have a lot of experience baking with banana.

Mash the bananas and add the baking soda and let sit for 2-3 minutes.

Cream the butter and sugar, then add in the egg, mix well, then add in the banana mixture and mix all together.

Now take all your dry ingredients and give them a good whisk and add to the banana mixture. Mix it all up until you have a really nice dough. Now is where you will decide, nuts, no nuts or chocolate chips. Add about a cup of your choice and give a good stir. As you can see the end result is a good looking dough.

Drop onto a parchment lined cookie sheet to your desired size and bake at 350 for 11 minutes. Just until the edges start to turn brown. When that starts to happen, take them out right away, these are a bit sticky and flimsy right out of the oven. They need some time to rest on the hot cookie sheet, this will give them a few minute of residual baking and allow you to remove them from the sheet in one piece.

This is a really good recipe, and one that I am going to play around with for sure, so you might see it again on a Monday with some changes. These had a nice banana flavor, and the spices worked well with the chocolate, kind of giving everything a little kick. I will say they are not the prettiest cookie I have ever baked, but the flavor is there, so who cares, right.